Shards
by ClaraBragge-Ravenclaw
Summary: Sometimes it is the person who accepts you at your lowest is where you find an unwavering ally. Alone and angry, Draco is not expecting understanding or salvation. He's not expecting the gift he has been given, but he is still a Malfoy, he isn't one to not accept it. Rated M for a reason. Language and Loathing


Warning: Demonstration of self-harm and strong language

Something that popped into my head and needed to get out. Enjoy! I don't own anything.

oOoOo

I can tell you the exact _fucking_ moment it started.

The bloody Room of Hidden Things was a mess. A disaster.

The stale air, coated with the lingering scent of burnt shit. Junk. Garbage. Just. Like. Me.

I breathe. It's rancid.

My head is telling me I'm smelling burnt human. Crabbe's burning flesh. I deserve it. I keep breathing it in to punish myself a little more.

Again. Inhale. I smell wood and paint. I smell that Goddamned Vanishing Cabinet. The fucking cabinet I spilt blood over. The thing that sealed my dammed fate.

Inhale. I smell fucking Bellatrix, the crazy bitch. I smell her putrid breath and her unwashed hair. I smell her stench like a black cloud around my head.

Inhale. Death. Death of my friend. Death of my innocence. Death of my future. Death of any hopes I could ever have.

I am surrounded. Surrounded by burnt junk like my burnt soul.

Mountains of shit. Shit that time has forgotten and people don't remember. Walking past that castle wall, like this isn't on the other side. This is where my privileged life truly ended.

I walk around the half decimated piles. Tables, beds, chairs, and the like. Burnt, charred, scorched. Some ashes black as night. Ashes from wood as white as the light that my soul doesn't see. Swirling greyish-black plumes swell up as I step over the barely recognizable objects. Reminding me of the dementors that reside in my nightmares. Every. Night.

Suddenly my hands meet the floor, kicking up another dust cloud, being sucked deep into my nose and lungs as I gasp. My arms slide out from underneath me as they landed on something unstable. The slice is quick and sharp. It shocks me. Pains me. Grounds me.

There, to the right of my greatest mistake, my ticket to Father's approval. Approval that never came. The skin split in two, a clean cut, a shard of mirror sticking out of the wound, and I stared at it. Blood ran down my arm to my elbow where it drops, drops, drops to the blackened stone floor.

I reach and pull it out. Not thinking about my life essence that is spilling, wasted. Worthless. Holding it in my right. Staring. My reflection clouded. Analyzing. Like it's an answer, an omen.

Without a second thought, I stabbed the skull, right through the third eye. Straight down. The sting! The _fire_. I have never felt so insane, yet so alive. ALIVE.

Again. Through the eyes. Again. Through the snake.

Again. Again. Again.

Until all that can be seen is red. Panting. Sweating. Living. The pool beneath me, the uneven circle surrounded by splatters. Mixing with the ash.

A sardonic bark leaves my throat. _Ironic_, isn't it? My blood looks _muddy_. All my life I was told I was special. Sacred. And now? I'm a nobody. A waste. I AM what they preached. Worthless.

"DIDN'T SEE THAT FATHER, DID YOU!?" I yelled to the cavernous space as I jumped to my feet. "BASTARD!" Panting harder, my hands clenched into fists. The blood coating my palms, dripping from between the bent fingers. My nails cutting crescents into my palms.

"YOU SPINELESS BASTARD! I HATE YOU!" At this point I fell. Fell to my knees, my face falling to my hands. The tears leaving my chin and leaving clear trails down my reddened arm.

Time moved forward and I fell further down. Physically numb. My forearms hitting the floor, breathing the upturned ashes and the smell of fresh blood, causing ripples in my small puddle, and I cried. Cried like the young boy I so desperately wished I was. Desperately wanted to be. The boy who lost himself in this very room.

I cried for every horror I'd seen. Howled for every dream that was crushed. Sobbing for every mark on my irredeemable soul.

My dignity in tatters. My pride, non-existent.

That was how she found me.

I saw her shoes first.

I heard her voice next.

I felt her arms wrap around me.

The scent of lavender and vanilla surrounded me. And I broke again.

Compassion. Kindness. Light and goodness.

Holding me like she is holding me together. And in a way she is. In this moment, she is my strength, while I strip myself bare. Letting every injustice out. Releasing the disappointments. Mourning the things that I hadn't been able to mourn. Letting them go.

We shifted. Her arms never releasing my shaking, sobbing body. Giving me the comfort I hadn't received in years. And as I lay, half in her lap, she held tight. The blood and ash transferring to her. And she doesn't shy away. She didn't let go.

"It will be ok, Draco. You'll see. We will get through this. We will get through this." Repeating this. Repeating it till it sinks in. Repeating it until the words create a hole in my cloudy pit of despair, allowing a single ray of light to get through. Casting a warm spot of the span of soul it hits.

"I'll help Draco. I'll help. You are not alone. I know it feels that way," she spoke softly, "but you _aren't_. We are all fucked up. _All_ of us. It will be ok… It will be ok."

I hope she is right.

With one arm still wrapped by my left ear, across my chest, and her hand gripping my shirt near my right arm, she started rubbing my back with her free as I ended my emotional release. Singing a foreign lullaby, as the last erratic breaths leave me, leaving me calmer, lighter. Freer.

And we lay there, me not having the energy to move, staring at those piles of ruined, destroyed things. Peaceful silence surrounds us and for the first time in a long time, there is silence in my head as well.

"Why don't we get ourselves cleaned up. Maybe you can convince the elves to cook something for us. I'm sure we missed dinner." She broke the silence.

I rolled off her, pushing myself into a seated position again, and looked at her.

"What?" She asked, "Most of them still think I am going to try to free them." She finished with a rueful grin.

I chuckled at that. Chuckling at the reprieve it brings, dropping my arms open, forgetting my mess.

Her eyes met mine, with a look I couldn't place, she started rolling up her sleeve. Where that foul, inaccurate word sat, there were scratches. Wide, zigzagged scratches.

I searched her face for an answer.

"In my sleep. I scratch in my sleep. Especially in nightmares. Once it dried to the sheets and caused this scar that even dittany couldn't fix." Her words held the same emotions shown on her face. Sorrow. Embarrassment. Disappointment.

Pulling my left arm back into my lap with my right, I stroked the now tacky, bloody skin. Staring at my handiwork, all I could say to her was, "I just want it gone." My voice hoarse from the last several hours.

"Do you trust me not to harm you?" She asked hesitantly and I nodded my head.

"Yes."

She reached out and took my arm, cleansing it and healing the massacre of my skin.

"What do you love?" She asked, not looking up.

Easy. "My mother." I responded.

"Anything else?"

"The stars. Dragons."

"Any particular breed?" Amusement in her voice.

"Yeah, Antipodean Opaleye."

She chuckled and I looked down at her and what she was doing.

What I didn't expect was her to be holding her wand like a quill.

What I didn't expect was the change to my arm.

And I wasn't completely prepared when she shifted out of my way to give me a full view of my arm.

Sitting on the top of what once was the skull, was a beautiful, pearlescent Opaleye. Iridescent and perched proudly, looking up to my heart. The setting sun of yellows, oranges, and purples behind her. The skull was made to look like a round astronomer's map with the Draco constellation centered. Other notable ones surrounding it. The stars looked like those gems the muggleborns would wear in their ears, the tiny diamonds. And the snake. The snake wasn't fully visible. It was covered by a bed of Narcissus flowers, looking like they were blowing in the wind. The flowers creating a base for the globe-like map. The parts of the snake still visible were made to look like greenery.

"Do you like it?" Her hesitation prominent. "Many don't know I can draw. If you don't like it, it's not permanent. I…"

"It's beautiful." I pause to collect my thoughts. I could only think of one thing to say.

"Thank you, Hermione. Thank you." Conviction was mixed with my broken, emotional words. "I love it. Thank you. Thank you." I reached over and hugged her, surprising a squeak out of her.

Pulling back, her face was tinted pink, and a smile graced her lips. And I felt the clouds in my heart dissipate a little more. I vowed then not to fuck this up. Make sure she didn't leave.

"I can make it permanent if you want."

"Yeah?" My eyes hopeful.

She pointed to herself. "Brightest witch and all that shite." I laughed and gestured to her drawing on my arm, giving her permission.

"Permenans atramento." She said waving her wand.

Standing up and cleaning herself off, she then reached down to offer me her hand. "Come on Draco, I believe you owe me dinner."

Grasping her hand and getting up, I laughed. It felt good laughing. "It's a date, Granger."

oOoOo

Review please!

-Clara


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